My birthday party consisted of cocktails at a Seamstress bar (how appropriate), delish dumplings in Chinatown and then the crescendo, hours of karaoke!

Unfortunately, I was having WAY too much fun to take any photos. Yep, that’s right, I didn’t take ONE photo lol… Luckily I was able to scrounge around and get a few from other partygoers. They all look something like this, so I won’t be repetitive and will just give you one. Don’t look at those creases, I’d been sitting down for a couple of hours before this was taken.

Dress details

This number combines the bodice of Sewaholic’s Lonsdale, and the pencil skirt (minus the high waistband) from Gertie’s book.

Amazingly, I didn’t have to make one change to the bodice! I made one size bigger in the skirt though to account for ease required due to no stretch in the fabric.

Enlarged the front waist darts because it was puffing out away from the body.

Due to the long straps of the bodice, this chewed up a lot of fabric – just a note.

I made the dress out of a ‘vintage’ print cotton, and lined the bodice with a blue rayon, both from Spotlight. This lining is what started my love affair with rayon.

If I had my time again I’d add a kick pleat to the skirt, there’s a lot of stress put on one little join at the moment and its already starting to show after only one wear. I only realised this would happen after cutting the skirt out – too late!

I am very happy with this dress! I love the shape, so I may even make it again.

I want to write a review for Pattern Review on this dress, but I’m not sure whether to list this as Lonsdale, Gertie’s skirt, or both (do a review for each). What do you think?

Here’s a few extra birthday pics, just for fun 🙂 I cropped others out to be polite because I am so unorganised I didn’t get around to asking anyone if they minded being put on the interwebs before writing this post.

Lol. I was surprised with a cake with my face on it – scary! (yet delicious)

I don’t know about you, but my day is always brightened when a delivery arrives at my desk – especially when it’s a couple of boxes like these!

So what’s in the boxes hey? That’s the big question 🙂

1. Sven clogs

Ever since I saw Sarai’s beautiful silver Sven clogs, I was all like, “oh lordy, I gots to get me a pair of those!”. So when I saw them on sale at Fab, I snapped a pair right up. Unfortunately Fab doesn’t ship to little old Australia, but fear not, that’s where USA Shopping Affair comes in – thank you very much!

2. Tracing paper galore

I’m a bit tardy in actually completing my bombshell dress – fitting is getting me down – and I had really crappy tracing paper to work with, but I took it upon myself to order some what is hopefully amazingly useful waxed tracing paper from Richard the Thread, one of the suppliers Gertie recommends in the course. The minimum order was $35, so I think I now have enough tracing paper to last a lifetime… in three different colours.

3. Wiksten Patterns

I know you can download these little beauties, but I’m a bit old school and like to have my hands wrapped around something concrete. Kollabora was having a sale, so I grabbed these and added to my order sitting with USA Shopping Affair.

The one thing that confuzzled me during construction were the cuffs/bands. I was having some serious ‘I don’t get it’ moments when putting these together, so I thought I’d share the details in case anyone else suffers the same moments. The stripes were messing with my head… This method will actually be relevant for any knit cuffs too.

Step 1

Lay your cuff on a flat surface right side up, with the top of the cuff at the top and the bottom at the bottom (i.e. closest to you). Fold in half on the vertical. You’ll then have a fold on the LHS, wrong side up, and the two edges on the RHS. Pin and sew the seam down the RHS using the allowance the pattern asks for. Making sure you match up your stripes too if you dare go to stripetown.

Step 2

Press the seam allowance open.

Step 3

Turn through halfway – with the wrong sides inside. In my case I had to make sure that the halfway point lined up with a stripe. Also, just watch the seam allowances and flatten them out again if they bunch up – avoiding bulk.

Step 4

Pin the open seam and baste in place – again, watching stripes if necessary.

Step 5

Take the cuff and insert it down the sleeve, lining up the raw edges of the cuff with the raw edge of the sleeve. Line everything up and sew the cuff to the sleeve. I basted first to make sure my stripes played nice. Don’t forget to line up your seams and notches. 🙂

And when sewing, make sure you’re only sewing one side and not catching the other also. It’s a bit fiddly, but just take it slow.

Step 6

Overlock (serge) the raw edge. I don’t like the idea of having to unpick overlocking (as detailed in, ‘Renfrew you, Renfrew me‘), so I turn through and check everything is just so (just ‘sew’ lol) before overlocking.

Step 7

Turn through and voila! A very nice looking cuff. A press probably wouldn’t hurt here too.

And that’s it! Is this how you make knit cuffs? It’s probably a bit old hat, but I wanted to get it down in case I suffer from another case of sewers confusion! Hopefully it’s at least helpful for some of you!

I was absolutely delighted last Christmas to receive a Japanese pattern book from my lovely friend Lulu. What added to it is that Lulu’s not even a sewer, but she was all over the Japanese pattern books – loved it!

The first pattern I made, and unfortunately the only one I’ve made so far, is G – Shirred dress – using a Japanese cotton from Spotlight teamed with a cute cotton trim from Tessuti.

This is me, wearing my ‘dress’ (that I’ve actually decided is a tunic – way too short for me as a dress!). I did think about adding extra length to make it more of a dress length, but I like wearing tunic length tops so left it as it was.

Don’t mind the creases!

Here’s a close up of the trim and shirring. It was the first time I’d shirred anything, it wasn’t hard – I’d recommend you give it a go, if you haven’t already of course! The pattern called for four rows of shirring, but I added an extra one (total of five rows) at the top to stop any gaping/flapping at the neckline.

I was lazy and didn’t baste the trim first which made it a bit of a &^%$ to sew on, but by the time I’d hit the trouble spots (namely, the corners) I’d gone too far and was way past stopping so I ploughed on- you know how it is. That, and the fact the print on the fabric hides a multitude of sins – like ugly stitching 🙂

One other ‘moment’ I had – I stupidly cut out the sleeves together without ‘good sides together’ so I ended up with two sleeves shaped the same. Luckily there was only a slight difference between the front and back of the sleeve in this pattern, so I just altered the seam allowance a little on one to make it work.

A couple of other notes:

I redrafted the facings to make them wider, and separate pieces, rather than one long, thin piece of about 1.5 cm width. One, because it was easier to sew that way, and two, because the wider facings would sit better while being worn.

These patterns keep you on your toes – there’s many different seam allowances used and I decided to follow the instructions on this. You need to make sure you’re all the ball and using the correct allowance size on the correct seam.

So that’s my first foray in to the world of Japanese patterns – and I like it! Have you sewn any garments out of any of the Japanese pattern books? What did you think?

There was Simplicity 7780 with a range of shirts, from 1968, and Butterick 4225 with a lovely dress and jacket (can’t see a date on this one, but to my untrained eye it looks maybe 1970s). How exciting!

The dress in particular struck me, and made me think of the black and white bird fabric I’d seen over at Bimble and Pimble… may just have to get my butt down to Spotlight to pick some up – I think it would work! The neckline of this dress also reminds me of the new Colette patterns, Hazel and Lily.

And finally, I spent the afternoon at Love Vintage yesterday with two lovely ladies from my sewing class. Where I picked up these patterns…

The blouse on the right is my favourite 🙂 It seems I did have a blonde moment when purchasing these unfortunately (nothing against blondes – I was one for many many years)… See the middle pattern, yep, the one with the lovely pussy bow blouse? Yep. Right. Well it’s actually a pattern for the skirts not the blouse. Doh! Not that I hate the skirts or anything, but I really did only buy it for the blouse! Dammit! I only realised when I got home…

I also got these magnificent Alexis Kirk earrings that I am completely in love with. Now I just need to find somewhere to wear them…

And I’m still chugging along with my Beignet… not long to go now, here’s a sneak peak…

It’s finished! Just in time for the early winter we seem to be experiencing, I’ve finished my first mustard delight, v8146. I’ve already spilled the details of the alterations etc in a previous post ‘v8146 – nearly there‘, so now I can regale you with photos 🙂 And I’ll throw in a few fun facts too.

Fun facts start now:

There was just under 5 metres of seam binding involved in my rendition of v8146. I think it looks pretty. I could have got away without finishing the seams with this fabric, but decided to bind certain seams just in case anyone ever gets a look at them.

v8146 seam binding

The delightful lining was cut to match up and replicate on both the right and left sides.

Exhibit A: lining on one side

Lining on one side

Matches Exhibit B, lining on the other side…

Ta da – matchy matchy!

Oh yeah, and the lining at the cuffs also matches.

More matchy 🙂

Here’s a look at the buttons (well a button anyway!) I sewed these on over the top of the magnets. This was a challenge to start with, but then I came up with some weird way to sew them on which worked.

And here’s the final product!

Let me know what you think!

Don’t you just love finishing a project!? It’s the perfect opportunity to start something new 😉 I’m now knee deep in a Beignet – can’t wait to finish! Of course 😉

I had some divine mustard wool/cashmere blend (I think!) from The Fabric Store sitting around that was just begging to become a coat. One night while reviewing my pattern stash I thought, “Hang on a minute! I’ll use v8146 to create my first mustard delight”. I say ‘first’ because I have another mustard coat/jacket planned – obsessed much? Anyway, the only thing that irked me about v8146 is that it wasn’t lined, but I decided mine would be anyway 🙂

I jumped on the old Google to search for examples of others who had made this jacket, but I could only find the completed dress at Textisles and completed jacket at Orchids In May. Maybe there are more out there and I am just a bad searcher 🙂

V8146

The details so far…

To start with…

I cut a size 14 pattern based on bust size.

After paper fitting, I added 20cm to jacket length, and 10cm to the sleeve length pattern pieces. I have a long body and before adding the length it sat much too high – more like a bolero, and I wanted more length in the body and full length sleeves – rather than the 3/4 sleeves the pattern provides for.

After toile…

After completing and trying on the toile;

I added another 3cm to the sleeve length, another 5cm to the jacket length (to allow for hems) and 1cm width to the underarm to allow for movement in the thicker wool fabric and to avoid the lining splitting.

I also drafted a lining pattern for the jacket front, but planned to use other pattern pieces as is for lining pattern.

Decided that I didn’t actually want the collar as per pattern, which led to drafting a neck line facing, and some edits to the lining pattern pieces.

The lining fabric has a gorgeous pattern on it, so it was cut to make sure the pattern was highlighted appropriately :o) This meant that I actually ran out of the patterned lining and I didn’t have enough for the full sleeves. Enter another pattern alteration. Sleeves were slashed into two pieces (upper and lower), and the patterned fabric was used for the lower pieces so that if the cuffs were rolled up your eyes are delighted with pretty patterns, and the upper sleeves that aren’t really visible were made from some newly acquired lining in a complementary colour.

The mustard fashion fabric doesn’t fray so I didn’t have to finish the edges – yay! However, I did bind a few particular seams that may see the light of day in a satin mustard bias binding.

I have giant coconut buttons to add. But buttonholes at the size required would be unsightly. So instead I’m using magnets for closures, with the buttons sewn on for looks only 🙂

You would have seen a little splash of this jacket and the seam binding as a work in progress in A new winter wooly, and here’s a shot of the magnets being tacked in.

And the giant coconut buttons…

Did you know…

Now, if you ‘like’ ZoSews on Facebook, you may have seen my post yesterday – so my apologies for repeating! But, for those of you who didn’t see it, did you know that an odd number of buttons is more pleasing to the eye ? It’s true! So while I do have four buttons above, I will only be using three 🙂

I made these out a mystery black fabric from Cutting Edge Fabrics, it’s some kind of blend, and it’s heavy and drapey – and lovely to wear! I lined them with purple charmeuse, from Spotlight. And they remind of pants Samurai would wear (or hakama), hence this post’s title 🙂

Here is the photo overload!

“Were there any adjustments to the pattern?”, I hear you ask. Of course there were 😉

Adjustments

Mock fly front – this was easy to do, I just followed Connie Amaden Crawford’s instructions from A Guide to Fashion Sewing

Added 7 cm in length between the waistline and crotch line

Other details

Naughty naughty, I didn’t add the lace around the hems. I intended to, I swear! I bought the lace, and had it ready to go, but then was too impatient. I did still hand stitch them up though 🙂

This was the first time I got to play with buttons and button holes. I haven’t done any since – need I say more 😉 Nah, it was ok, I’m just a little particular so it took me quite a few times to get it close to perfect. (I was going for ‘perfect’, but my impatient nature kicked in again, so ‘close to’ had to do 🙂 )

I didn’t do the French Tack between the lining and fashion fabric, I don’t think it’s made a difference.

If I were to make these again, I’d have a go at an alteration to remove the bunching fabric at my lower back.

These were the first pants I made, and I love them and wear them all the time. Win.

And in other news, I’ve extended my foray into gardening. I only have a small balcony so not much space to play with, but I started with potted herbs (coriander died and was replaced with a strawberry), and now I’ve graduated to a lime tree and lemon tree. Let’s see how long I can keep them alive!

As you may have seen in a recent post, I had a bookish, sewing surprise turn up not so long ago! Janene of Ooobop! fame was particularly interested in, and very subtly suggested that I review one of these books – Claire Shaeffer’s revised and updated Couture Sewing Techniques. So here goes Janene! 🙂

I would like to preface this review with the sad fact that I in fact have not had a chance to read this cover to cover, but I will give you my thoughts so far.

Beautiful images and secrets

I am thoroughly enjoying this book, and I am particularly enjoying looking at the beautiful images of couture garments, many of which are actually from the authors own collection (jealous much?!), and others from a range of museums. Not only do you get to see the gorgeous exterior of these garments, but we as readers are treated to the behind the scenes ‘innards’ view – and it’s amazing!

Have you ever wondered how couture garments sit ‘just so’ on the wearer? There’s a ‘stay’ for everything, or perhaps weights were used in the hem, or maybe there’s a harness in there – you’ll never know (until you read this book of course!).

Look at all these secret closures - Marc Bohan for Dior

From the author's collection, without the harness shown on the right, this Oscar de la Renta dress would fall open and shift off the shoulders.

Behind the scenes

I also particularly enjoying travelling into my imaginary world where I can afford to purchase couture garments! Early on, Claire takes the reader into a Parisian house of couture and explains the process you would go through to order a couture design. Right from making an appointment with the directrice, through to the premiere taking your measurements, and finally the design being logged into the livre de compte, and being carefully packed and delivered to your hotel or shipped to your home.

What? A girl can dream 🙂

Haute couture versus ready-to-wear

Now I don’t know about you, but I’ve always wanted to know exactly what makes a garment ‘couture’ as opposed to high end ready-to-wear (RTW). Ms Shaeffer has answered my prayers with a lovely double page spread table comparing many, many features. There’s a taste of this marvellous table below.

Introduction to Haute Couture vs Ready-to-Wear

So what else is covered?

As I mentioned earlier, I haven’t gotten through this delight in its entirety – unfortunately! But for your information, the book is basically split into two sections, Part One: The Basics of Couture Sewing, and Part Two: Applying Couture Techniques. I’ve covered off a little bit of part one above. What I’ve shown above is almost the background information I guess, but the book does get much more practical, showing the reader how to execute these gorgeous techniques.

Hints and diagrams

And along with Claire’s descriptions and ‘how-tos’, we readers are treated to many diagrams and hints – yay! – a sample of which you can see below.

An example of the diagrams and hints throughout this book.

So, overall, I think this book’s a winner! And for only $25 (or thereabouts), you can’t really go wrong!

Have you read Couture Sewing Techniques? What did you think?

Apologies for the photography, but I don’t profess to be a photographer 😉

Oh and one other thing…

The Versatile Blogger award

The gorgeous Tina over at Down the Retro Rabbit Hole passed me ‘The Versatile Blogger’ award – oh em gee, thank you Tina!! Tina’s from Philadelphia in the United States, and describes herself as “Borderline crazy cat lady with an affinity for old things…” – I do like me a crazy cat lady! And Tina loves grammar – I love grammar too! I do get a bit loose in the blog world though (I’m sorry, perhaps it’s my pathetic form of rebellion) 🙂 Anyway…

So, what exactly does this Versatile Blogger Award entail?

It does come with a few rules:

Add the badge to the winning blog page. tick

Thank the blogger who gave it. tick

List the rules. tick

List seven (7) random facts about yourself. see below

The ritualist passing on of the award to fifteen (15) deserving and conscientious bloggers who are nominated for their diligence, demonstrated skill, and achievements in the world of blogging and specifically in the sewing related category. wow-wee! 15 is a lot! I’m sorry to be a party pooper, but I’m going to go for five (ok, maybe six – seven) instead.

Contact the nominated bloggers and let them know they are a recipient. I’ll do this soon – promise!

Hmm, so seven random facts about me hey…. what a boring topic, but I’ll do what I’m told. Here goes:

I luuurrve animals. Not the insecty or scaly types though. I have a particular affinity for cute furry ones. (See picture of cute, furry animal below for an example.)

I am addicted to extra-curricular activities. In my life I have participated in the following: lots and lots of netball, basketball, sewing, salsa, art classes, drama classes, jazz ballet, gymnastics, flute lessons, piano, ballet and that’s all I can remember at the moment. If I had my way, I wouldn’t work, and I would do extra-curricular activities all day everyday! That reminds me, must investigate pattern making courses…

I enjoy driving – particularly long distances, with the stereo pumping – but I do not like parking (or turning right onto busy roads).

I am aiming to run an 8km fun run in May this year. We’ll see! (Note: I have completed the Oxfam Trailwalker 100km walk, so there is hope I can complete this run!)

I love Italy, and nearly all things Italian. Including but not limited to, pasta, wine, Rome etc etc. I spent two weeks there in 2009 and LOVED it.

I would really, really, really like an iPad 🙂

Ollie, the cute, furry animal. A friend's latest addition to the family - so cute!!

Soooooo, who shall I choose as the next round of winners… (I’ve tried to change these out from my recent Liebster Blog Award nominees, sharing the love and all – you know how it goes.)

Seamstress: Poppykettle: The lovely Ms. Poppykettle pumps out the sewing delights, while also offering very clear tips and techniques. I just couldn’t resist throwing one of these her way, we sewed at the same school!

Tilly and the Buttons: I’ve been following Tilly’s sewing exploits for a while, she creates the most gorgeous numbers.

Jorth: Another Melbourne blogger who I’ve been lurking about for some time. Jorth has the cutest writing style, and gorgeous photography.

Splatastic: Yet another Melbournite I’ve been lurking about. Natalie’s garments are so CUTE!

Sew Tessuti: One more from Melbourne 🙂 I’m particularly fond of the pattern reviews on Sew Tessuti, and I also love seeing all the ways people create garments with their fabrics from Tessuti – especially when they’ve used a fabric I would never have considered and it looks amazing!

Last one, Janene from Ooobop! I am barely two months into this blogging thing, and Janene was the first to comment on my blog *ooowwww!* She is also very clever at pumping out Dorothy Dresses in an evening, and makes lots of pretty quilting blocks.

Special mention must go to JuliaBobbin too, I would have obviously thrown my classmate one of these awards, but Tina already covered her off! Yay Julia!

On my sewing table

- Colette Sorbetto
- Bombshell dress

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